


Reflection

by ThatStupidDeer



Category: Destiny (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, Mother-Daughter Relationship, some cute mother-daughter fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-12 02:24:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18002015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatStupidDeer/pseuds/ThatStupidDeer
Summary: Ronja is a curious girl, and often asks her mother questions, most of which Mara is content to answer. But Mara never expected the question of her own mother to ever come up.





	Reflection

Mara is seated on the couch, legs up and crossed with her ankles together. Her daughter is settled in the space of her crossed legs, like a baby bird in a nest. The air is quiet beyond the sound of breathing, and the occasional rustle of clothing as Ronja adjusts her seat to get more comfortable. Every movement the girl makes causes pin and needles in Mara’s legs, but she cares little about the normally irritating sensation. Nothing is irritating with the little girl in her lap.

She is braiding Ronja’s hair. White as starlight and snow, and falling passed her shoulders already, she has a lot to work with, and the braids she strings together are small and neat. With each braid done, another lock of hair is weaved around them, before she ties the braid off with a little hair elastic that feels like it could snap in her fingers if she is not careful. She is gentle with each weaving motion, careful to not pull the girl’s hair and cause her discomfort.

The silence between them is soon broken as Mara begins to hum a wordless tune. The notes had been sitting in the back of her throat, waiting to come out, and she has finally slipped into enough of a comfortable state of mind that she allows them to leave her lips. A gentle rise and fall of notes, soft and comforting. A lullaby she remembers from her own childhood, perhaps from when she was not much older than Ronja.

She hums the tune circular, though it is hard to say where the music ends and begins again. Over and over again, she hums the song, feeling every note in her nose and throat. Little breaths interrupt the song here and there, but never break the song in two, never keep it from truly ending.

It only stops because she hears the telltale breath of her daughter, the sound that always comes before a question.

“Mom?”

“Yes, my star?” Mara replies, and the humming ceases. Her fingers on the braids go still as she feels Ronja turn her head just enough that she can see the glow of her eyes searching her out in her peripherals.

“What are you humming? I’ve never heard you hum before,” she asks. The girl turns her upper body as much as she can, no longer satisfied with just looking at her mother out of the corner of her eye.

“An old song, from when I was your age,” Mara replies. She gestures for the girl to turn round again, and Ronja does so, but not without a sigh. Mara resumes her braiding, ears attuned to the questions she knows are about to leave her daughter’s curious lips.

“What was the song, Mom?” she asks.

“I don’t remember the name. It’s been too long for me to remember such a detail,” she admits, her braiding slowing as her attention is split. “But I remember my mother singing it to me. I don’t remember most of the words, but I remember the tune.”

Ronja is silent again, and Mara is able to focus on the braiding. She knows there are more questions, though; she can all but hear them churning in the girl’s head. She always has so many questions to ask, and Mara is willing to answer any that she can. To discourage curiosity is to discourage growth, and she cannot have that in her own child.

Another breath in. “Mom?”

“Mm.”

“How come I’ve never met your mom? She would be my grandma, right?”

Oh, how that amuses Mara. What would Osana do, if she was called that? She is sure that her mother never thought she would ever be made a grandmother, and if they ever met again, she doubts her mother would believe her if she told her so. “Yes, she would be your grandmother.”

“Oh. Well, how come I haven’t met her?” Ronja repeats her first question, having not gotten an answer the first time.

Mara is unsure of just how to answer. She has never told her daughter of where they came from, where the Awoken had been truly born. Most Awoken, beyond those that arrived on that exodus, did not know the full and true story of their birth as a people.

“She is not with us,” Mara replies, weaving together another braid, and tying it off at the end. By now, three braids are done, two on one side, and one on the other. She is beginning the last one, and once that is done, she will pull them back and pin them to create a crown of braids. A fitting style for a princess. “That is why you’ve never met her.”

“Oh.” Ronja’s tone is filled with disappointment. Mara is unsure if Ronja is fully aware of the concept of death yet, but she still hopes that she will assume Osana is dead, and that the thought will bring the end of this line of questions. Mara does not wish to force Ronja to end them; she needs to find the end of this line herself.

A breath in. “Then where is she?”

“Gone, Ronja. She is not with us. You will, unfortunately, never get to meet her. I wish you could, but…” Is it possible? Could Osana, or any of the other Awoken of the Distributary find their way here? She still remembers how she had refused to go with them, how she had refused to join them in the world they were meant to live in. She had not wanted to leave her immortality, and the life she had become accustomed to, behind. “...It is just not possible.”

“Oh. I wish I could meet her,” Ronja says, and she seems to have come to end of her line of questions concerning her grandmother. Mara feels some relief, but a deep feeling of sorrow has settled in her chest. She has not spoken of Osana in a long time. Decades, perhaps centuries, even. She would never admit it aloud, but she misses her mother, nor would she ever admit that having a daughter of her own has put her mother’s words and actions into perspective.

She remembers how she had always been so adamant about being more of a friend to Osana than a daughter, and how Osana had gone along with it. Only now does Mara consider how much it may have hurt her mother to do so. She cannot imagine what she would do or say, if Ronja came to her one day and said the same to her, as she had done to her own mother so long ago. It would crush her, to be unable to be the guiding hand in her daughter’s life, the one she looks up to for everything until she is ready to meet the world head on.

Mara’s fingers abandon the final, half-done braid in her daughter’s white hair, and she leans forward so that she can cover her daughter’s body with her own, and hold her within her arms, like a shield to protect her. She feels tension in her daughter’s back, and there is a moment where she thinks Ronja may attempt to shrug away from her, but she feels a comforting pressure against her chest and hips as Ronja leans into her.

Another breath in. “Mom?”

“Yes, my star?”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, my star.” She will be. “I love you, Ronja. I hope you know that.”

“I know. I love you too, Mom,” Ronja replies without pause. It makes Mara’s heart swell with unbridled joy, to hear those words from her daughter’s lips. Words she never truly said to her own mother. She is glad that Ronja will not make the same mistakes as she did.


End file.
